Love Is .........

1 장

2020

Daegu

The alarm set off at 5.00 am and broke the morning silence. Groggily, a woman turned off the alarm into the snoozing mode. '10 more minutes', she muffled to herself. She only had less than 4 hours of sleep for finishing up the inventory list of the new cafe that will open tomorrow. She works as an assistant to the supervisor of a chain coffee shop. Her task is helping her supervisor in handling cafe shop owners under the management of their company's chain. Her main task mainly involved in updating the inventory. At times, she is needed to go to the cafes under her supervisor's supervision and help out on almost everything, from management work to checking up the stocktake. This is not the job that suits her qualification but she is not being fussy about it. She is grateful that she gets this steady job that gives her sufficient pay monthly.

After 10 minutes, her alarm went off again and she had no choice but to wake up as she still had a lot of things to prepare. She got up from her bed, washed her face and straight headed to the kitchen to prepare breakfast and lunch box for her son. Life is a little easier when she was staying with her parents as her mom will help her to prepare all that for Kang Hoon so she can get herself ready for work. Since she is no longer staying with them, she needed to do all that by herself. It is not something that she is unfamiliar with since she used to be a housewife for more than 10 years but being a working single mom is not an easy task.

It has been 3 months since she moved out of her parents' house with her son. She wanted to be independent as she realized she never lived on her own since young. During her early university days, she stayed in a shared house with other freshmen, and her meals were prepared by the owner, all she needed to manage is just her small room. Then, at the young age of 24, she got married. After she got divorced, she came back to her hometown and stayed with her family, so Eon Jin thinks it is about time for her to live alone and managed the household all by herself. She cannot rely too much on others and be dependent.

Time check; 6.30 am, time to wake her son for school. Her son, Kim Kang Hoon is now 11 and he is turning into a young teen which in a way makes Eon Jin a little bit sad. He is not a child anymore. Kang Hoon is her source of strength for these past 3 years. The reason she can moved on from the unfair divorce is her son. He motivates her to be better for him even as a single mom.

As she entered the room, she can only sigh looking at the way Kang Hoon is sleeping. He is sleeping on his side with his legs are wide open. Exactly like his father. That little boy though he does not look like his father that much, he inherits most of the behaviour. The way he sleeps, the way he eats, the way he walks, the way he runs, to the way he pouts when he got sulky. Kang Hoon will always be a reminder to her of that man.

"Kang Hoon ah, ireona (wake up). Time for school."

The little boy wiggled and pulled his blanket to cover his body. Not giving him a chance, Eon Jin pulled the blanket off him and slapped his arms lightly.

"Wake up. It's already 6.30 am. You need to go to school and Eomma needs to go to work. Wake up. Wake up."

Kang Hoon slowly opened his eyes and rubbed it. He sat up but still in his sleepy state. Eon Jin gently patted his cheeks to wake him up from his slumber.

"Faster, go and wash up and have your breakfast. Palli."

As she is about to get up, Kang Hoon held her hand and pulled her back to the bed.

"Wae?"

"I have not given you my morning ppo ppo," he kneeled and kissed his mom. One on each cheek and another on the forehead.